by Chris Agbo
Haruna Muhammad Tsafe is a deaf civil servant working with Federal Ministry of Interior. Haruna who have a master degree in International relations and diplomacy became deaf when he was 12 years as a result of a sickness. His parents tried their best to ensure that he regained his hearing but it wasn’t possible but his condition did not deter him from aspiring for greatness, he is the only graduate up to master’s degree level in his family. He is also married to a beautiful deaf lady whom he met in school and they are blessed with four beautiful children.
Haruna while answering question about his challenges in school, told the Qualitative Magazine that the major problem he faced in School was the communication barrier, during his bachelor degree, he was opportune to have a sign language interpreter made available by the school but during his master’s degree in University of Abuja, there was no such arrangement leaving him in state of exclusion but he was steadfast so he devised a way which was to buy all the text books since the courses were more of theory, he had to read on his own and graciously, he was able to pass all the courses. It wasn’t easy but he didn’t allow his disability to stand on his way of acquiring his master’s degree.
Speaking on his role as an advocate and a top member of Nigerian National Association of Deaf (NNAD), he called on the government to fully implement the disability rights act because it is the only panacea for improvement of the lives of the deaf persons and persons with disabilities in general.
As an advocate, in the next five years, he wants to see a situation whereby the disability act is being implemented and he has been helping deaf children to go to school, so he looks forward to see where a lot have been achieved in the area of education for the deaf children.
